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That was not by Rhee's orders, but more a reaction among the troops to the brutal occupation by KPA before the Incheon Landing reversed the tide. If your family had been looted, raped, executed, worked to death, marched off to the north, you might be more than slightly angry at DPRK collaborators.

Bodo League: Again, why I mentioned disconnect with reality. First there was the suspicious alleging of Rhee having ordered the execution when there have been no records of anything of the sort short of a single witness. Furthermore, supposing such an order had been given, it was two days after the war started, with Rhee already on his way to Busan. Would a sane person in any circumstances short of an ideological commitment (see national socialism) take the time to order executions as he is riding the train south?

Jeju Uprising: Not sure how on earth you can consider retaliation against the uprising (which was bloody, of course) to be on the same level or brutality as oppression of domestic citizens.

Not to defend all of Dr. Sun's actions, but I don't particularly see him in a negative light in comparison with all other "revolutionaries" making decisions for the betterment of specifically what they viewed to be "their" country and "their" people. (In full disclosure, I don't know if this is true or not, but my mother once told me that my grandfather had harboured him while he was travelling through Vietnam to some other place.)

Many if most of the same criticisms could be aimed at government/faction leaders in Japan and the U.S. if not around the whole world during the same time period. The fact that the current leaders of the PRC continue to embrace outdated ideologies is disappointing, but that's like blaming Claudius Ptolemaeus for people that currently still believe the Earth is the center of the universe.

EDIT: Not sure how I missed this one.. The tone of the article is mixed, albeit somewhat positive.

China official says spat with Japan derails free trade talks

(Reuters) - A festering territorial dispute between China and Japan has derailed talks for a free trade zone involving the two countries and South Korea, an adviser to China's central bank said on Thursday.

You're assuming that the alternate-history ROC that won the civil war and took charge of China would have been any better than the PRC is now.

Big assumption there, considering the pride of the Chinese people.

It could've been worse, it could've been better. That's not the point though. What aoihige was getting at if I'm right is that China went to an ideological extreme by adopting Communism as opposed to other east Asian countries, and in that sense ended up worse. At least in Japan the Orwellian atmosphere had been fully discredited after the war and the whole "all 100 million Japanese will die rather than surrender" mentality only lasted for a couple years. In the PRC, Mao, who killed more people than the Japanese, is still revered, people generally think of the Cultural Revolutions and Great Leap Forward as "mistakes", and the CCP is still in power in a dictatorial capacity.

The KMT also committed pretty horrible crimes, to be sure, but it was based in corruption and lack of central control as opposed to the CCPs' strategic-minded disregard for human rights and totalitarianism. For instance, the KMT executed Mao Zedong's wife for being active as a revolutionary but left his son alone. Under the CCP they would have certainly been tortured, re-educated, used in some way, and then executed if convenient. An example is in the ex-KMT troops who surrendered, and were then sent directly to Korea where most of them died, then the ones who were captured and repatriated were accused during the Cultural Revolution and then if there were still any left in the present day they are beggars on the street with no help from the party they were forced to serve.

Pan-Green people in Taiwan like to whine and moan about the KMT's dictatorship, and others like to discount the ROC's success by saying that it is a small and manageable island. If the CCP had ended up in control over Taiwan and not the mainland, it'd probably look like North Korea.

If the mainland were to fall under control of the ROC, the process would certainly be rockier, but you'd avoid so many calamities that were totally artificial and a direct result of the CCP's totalitarian instinct that it would be difficult to imagine this hypothetical ROC being worse off than the PRC is today. It may not have experienced the same rocketing economic growth, but in exchange its rise would be more gradual and come with less social conflicts. Most probably it would be somewhere near or a bit above the mark of the present-day PRC, but the path would be more stable and the society more normal, instead of the existing cultural void and cynicism, which is a totalitarian relic and something observed also in the former eastern bloc, like with East Germans or Russians.

(Reuters) - A festering territorial dispute between China and Japan has derailed talks for a free trade zone involving the two countries and South Korea, an adviser to China's central bank said on Thursday.

How the heck does the dispute has got to do with the free trade talks? Just include the Super Moe Joint Recreational Park Land Reclaimation Project into the itenary, dumbass.

__________________

When three puppygirls named after pastries are on top of each other, it is called Eclair a'la menthe et Biscotti aux fraises avec beaucoup de Ricotta sur le dessus.
Most of all, you have to be disciplined and you have to save, even if you hate our current financial system. Because if you don't save, then you're guaranteed to end up with nothing.

An interesting batch of speculation aside, I was actually assuming that aohige was saying that an alternate-history ROC government in China would behave any better towards the Senkaku issue than the present PRC does. And I'm pretty sure you're as aware as I am, that any Chinese government regardless of its stripe will cling pretty hard to the "One under Heaven" Manifest Destiny mindset, which means that a dominant ROC would probably be just as expansionist as the present PRC.

So, everything you said was interesting, but... not really what I was talking about.

An interesting batch of speculation aside, I was actually assuming that aohige was saying that an alternate-history ROC government in China would behave any better towards the Senkaku issue than the present PRC does. And I'm pretty sure you're as aware as I am, that any Chinese government regardless of its stripe will cling pretty hard to the "One under Heaven" Manifest Destiny mindset, which means that a dominant ROC would probably be just as expansionist as the present PRC.

So, everything you said was interesting, but... not really what I was talking about.

They may, or may not.
But current Taiwan's system is more compatible with co-existing of new and old values, closer to other republic states in the pacific and world wide.

Nothing is flowers and peaches, but hell, it's still a better alternative to that weird authoritarian communism-but-actually-not-really-communism they got going right now.

They may, or may not.
But current Taiwan's system is more compatible with co-existing of new and old values, closer to other republic states in the pacific and world wide.

Nothing is flowers and peaches, but hell, it's still a better alternative to that weird authoritarian communism-but-actually-not-really-communism they got going right now.

It is called pluto-cronism.

__________________

When three puppygirls named after pastries are on top of each other, it is called Eclair a'la menthe et Biscotti aux fraises avec beaucoup de Ricotta sur le dessus.
Most of all, you have to be disciplined and you have to save, even if you hate our current financial system. Because if you don't save, then you're guaranteed to end up with nothing.

I would have thought Taiwan only became how it is now because of the need to turn to the West as an ally against the immediate menace in the East (well geographically West but..). From what I know of history during the middle of WW2 and it's aftermath, both sides were pretty terrible really..

An essay contributed by Haruki Murakami to the Asahi Shimbun (September 28, 2012)

As a Japanese author, I was quite shocked to see in the news that Chinese bookstores removed titles written by Japanese authors from their shelves amid the escalating Senkaku Island dispute. It is still unclear whether this was an organized government-led purge or a voluntary removal by the shop owners, so I will refrain from giving my opinion one way or another for now.

Over the past 20 years or so, one of the most welcome achievements in East Asia has been the formation of a uniquely Asian cultural sphere. One of the biggest factors underlying this development is the remarkable economic growth of China, Korea and Taiwan. The strengthening of these countries’ respective economic systems enabled cultural exchange on equal terms, and as a result, people began transmitting a large volume of cultural output (i.e., intellectual property) back and forth across borders. A set of common rules was formulated, and the pirate editions once rampant in the region gradually began to disappear (or at least decline dramatically). In most cases, authors were now receiving the advances and royalties they rightly deserved.

Speaking from my own experience, I think it took a long time to get to this point. That’s how bad things used to be. While I won’t go into specifics (because it will get complicated), the current situation has improved incredibly, and the East Asian cultural sphere is gradually maturing into a rich and stable marketplace. Some individual problems still remain, but music, literature, movies and television programs are now exchanged freely and equitably within this market for many people to experience and enjoy. I think this is a truly wonderful success.

For example, the popularity of Korean television dramas led to many more Japanese people feeling an affinity for Korean culture, and the number of people taking Korean language classes soared. Comparable to this is how, when I was teaching at a university in the United States, numerous Korean and Chinese exchange students would visit my office.

Developing this favorable climate took many long years of hard work by many people. As one of these people, I, too, continued working—however minimal my efforts may have been—to this end. If we can sustain this kind of steady exchange, I am hopeful that Japan will work with the countries of East Asia to gradually resolve the various issues that exist between us, even if it may take a long time. One important aim of cultural exchange is to cultivate an awareness that, even though we may speak different languages, we are all human beings who share the same basic feelings and emotions. In other words, it is a path for the international flow of the human spirit.

As both an Asian author and a Japanese citizen, I am afraid that the recent disputes surrounding the Senkaku Islands and Takeshima may seriously damage the steady accomplishments that have been made.

As long as borders exist, territorial disputes are unfortunately unavoidable issues. That being said, I think they are issues that can and must be solved practically. When a territorial issue ceases to be a practical matter and enters the realm of 'national emotions', it creates a dangerous situation with no exit. It is like cheap liquor. Cheap liquor gets you drunk after only a few drinks and heightens your emotions. It makes you speak loudly and act rudely. Your logic simplifies and your become repetitive. But after your drunken rampage you are left with nothing but an awful headache the next morning.

We must be careful about politicians and polemicists who lavish us with this cheap liquor and stir up this kind of commotion. In the 1940s, Adolf Hitler solidified the foundation of the Nazi regime by consistently placing the recovery of the land Germany lost in World War I at the core of its policies.

We all know how that turned out. At a later date, both Japan and China will need to calmly examine why the Senkaku Islands dispute has escalated to such a degree. Politicians and polemicists merely inflame people with their forceful words, but those who actually get hurt are the ones on the front lines.

In my novel The Wind-up Bird Chronicle, I wrote about the Nomonhan Incident, a battle that erupted between Mongolia and Manchuria in 1939. It was short, yet brutal battle that arose from a border dispute. The Japanese Army engaged Mongolia and the Soviet Army in a fierce fight that resulted in the deaths of nearly 20,000 soldiers on both sides. After I wrote the novel, I visited Nomonhan. I stood in the middle of a vast wilderness, still littered with cartridges and soldiers' belongings, and was overcome by an intense sense of powerlessness as I wondered why so many people had to pointlessly kill each other for a barren sliver of land.

As I said earlier, I am in no position to state my opinion on the removal of Japanese authors' works from Chinese bookstores. That is strictly a domestic Chinese issue. As an author, I think it is extremely unfortunate, but there is nothing I can do about it. One thing I can say for certain is that I do not want Japan to take any retaliatory action against China. If that should happen, then the problem becomes ours, and our actions will come back to haunt us. Conversely, if we can demonstrate a calm demeanor and show that we will maintain the appropriate respect for another country's culture regardless of the current situation in that country, that would be a significant accomplishment. I believe that would be the polar opposite of cheap liquor.

At some point, the buzz from cheap liquor will wear off. But the path for the international flow of the human spirit must not be blocked. The blood, sweat and tears of many people toiling for many years went into forging that path. It is an important channel we will need to maintain no matter what.